Edna St. Vincent Millay

22 February 1892 – 19 October 1950 / Rockland / Maine / United States

The Courage That My Mother Had

The courage that my mother had
Went with her, and is with her still:
Rock from New England quarried;
Now granite in a granite hill.

The golden brooch my mother wore
She left behind for me to wear;
I have no thing I treasure more:
Yet, it is something I could spare.

Oh, if instead she'd left to me

The thing she took into the grave!—
That courage like a rock, which she
Has no more need of, and I have.
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